Today, many construction materials come in the form of substantially planar panels or rolls which are unrollable into, essentially, planar panels. The construction materials are, in both cases, secured with appropriate fasteners and/or adhesives to the framing members, sheathing and/or decking of building walls, floors, ceilings and roofs. Such construction materials comprise, without limitation: (a) drywall, gypsum board, plasterboard, cement board, greenboard, blueboard, wood, and foam board for use in forming interior, and in some cases exterior, building walls and/or ceilings; (b) felt paper, underlayments, membranes, wraps, and other similar materials that are generally applied to sheathing and/or decking to protect underlying building materials from the effects of weather, to reduce the amount of air and/or moisture infiltration through a building's structure, and/or to provide insulation against heat and sound transmission; and (c) other similar construction materials. The term “wallboard” is used herein to mean and refer, collectively, to such construction materials.
When individual panels or unrolled rolls of such wallboard are positioned side-by-side in/on a building structure as is often the case, the panels or unrolled rolls define gaps, seams or joints therebetween and are joined together with tape, sealant, filler and/or adhesive substances to form a monolithic structure. The tape may be manufactured from paper, fiberglass, or other material, be woven or non-woven, and be or not be backed with an adhesive substance. The sealant, filler and/or adhesive substances may include, but not be limited to, drywall compound, glue, caulk, resin, epoxy, and other similar substances that are collectively referred to herein by the term “mastic”. The tape and mastic may be used alone or in combination to seal, fill and/or hide the gaps, seams or joints and secure the individual panels or unrolled rolls together. When the tape and mastic are used in combination to hide a joint between wallboard members, the mastic aids in securing the tape to the wallboard.
The tape and mastic may be applied manually through use of appropriate hand tools. However, in building structures where a large number of gaps, seams or joints are present, the manual application of tape and mastic can consume a large amount of time and can have a potentially adverse impact on construction schedules. Therefore, to reduce the amount of time required to finish the gaps, seams and/or joints, a taping tool that aids in applying tape and/or mastic over the gaps, seams and/or joints may be utilized.
At least one manufacturer supplies a taping tool for use in applying tape and mastic to gaps, seams and joints between wallboard members. The manufacturer's taping tool has a creaser wheel that attempts to crease the tape along the tape's longitudinal axis as the tape exits the tool, thereby improving the tape's application to joints and, in particular, to joints forming inside corners. The taping tool also has a mechanism for advancing tape from a spool as the tape is applied to gaps, seams and/or joints.
Unfortunately, the position of the creaser wheel can be difficult to control and can require the taping tool's user to move his/her hands into different positions on the tool in order to cause and control movement of the creaser wheel. The necessity of such movement makes the taping tool difficult to use effectively. Additionally, the mechanism for advancing tape from the taping tool is complex and difficult to configure for use, and can be easily knocked out of configuration by rough handling of the tool as is prone to occur on a construction job site. In addition, the taping tool has significant length and can be awkward and difficult to manipulate into a desired position relative to a hard to reach gap, seam or joint to which a user is attempting to apply tape.
Therefore, there is a need in the industry for apparatuses and methods for applying tape and/or mastic to gaps, seams and/or joints between wallboard members that address the above-identified problems and, and that may address other problems, difficulties, and/or shortcomings of current technology that may or may not be described herein.